Hurricane recovery experts
SMU faculty are available to lend their expertise to journalists reporting on the aftermath of the recent hurricanes.
SMU faculty are available to lend their expertise to journalists reporting on all aspects of the Hurricane Harvey recovery efforts.
Cash is king when it comes to helping victims of natural disasters |
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| Michael Davis Economist in Cox School of Business mldavis@mail.smu.edu "But remember this: The goal of charity is not to make you feel better. It is to make other people feel better. And money is a more effective way to do get that done." |
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Compromised water brings disease first, then mosquitos |
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| John Easton Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering easton@lyle.smu.edu “We’re not in a developing part of the world where you start worrying about cholera and typhoid fever – big killers from 100 years ago – because we have relatively good access to medical care. But, when you have people walking around in water that might be contaminated with sewage, there is a higher risk for infection of the skin and so forth.” |
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Responding to the trauma of disaster |
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| Sarah Feuerback Director of the Center for Family Counseling sfeuerbach@mail.smu.edu “Children are in developmental stages ranging from learning safe attachment to their caregivers and environments, to learning to gain confidence in mastering new tasks and relationships. Children who experience trauma have each of those developmental stages disrupted and can become dysregulated in many aspects of their life.” |
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How small business owners can survive Harvey |
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| Jerry White Director of the Caruth Institute for Entrepreneurship jwhite@mail.cox.smu.edu "One of the greatest risks is whether your market that existed before the disaster will be there after the disaster. The skillful business person will invest some time and energy assessing the post-disaster target market." |
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After Harvey: Lost property titles, higher construction costs, affordable housing shortages loom |
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| Joseph Cahoon Director of SMU's Folsom Institute for Real Estate jcahoon@mail.smu.edu "We are going to see a run-up in construction pricing all across Texas. As both labor and materials are over-allocated to Houston in the recovery process, this will cause construction prices to rise elsewhere in the state." |
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Concrete jungle multiplies urban flood hazard |
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Barbara Minsker "Large cities prone to flooding should provide developers with incentives for building green infrastructure, such as rain gardens, wetlands, ponds, trees and parks, and permeable pavement that will better soak up rainfall. " |
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Economist ‘bullish’ on Houston’s economic recovery |
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| Cullum Clark Director of the SMU Economics Research Center jhclark@mail.smu.edu “I’m bullish on Houston. Compared to New Orleans going into Katrina, Houston enters with a vastly larger, much healthier economy. It had much more in the way of business and economic infrastructure. It is a far larger metro area – fifth in the nation. And it is above the national average in wealth, compared to New Orleans, which was one of the nation’s poorest metro areas ahead of Katrina.” |
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There is no gas shortage |
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Bruce Bullock |
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Damp, ruined communications devices follow floods
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| Suku Nair Chair of the Department of Computer Science and Engineering nair@lyle.smu.edu “Sometimes things are not as bad as they look,” Nair said. “The extent of loss or damage to your laptop or cellphone is often not proportional to the symptoms of physical damage. The level of recovery depends entirely on the extent of damage sustained by the electronics.” |
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President Trump's response to Hurricane Harvey |
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| Cal Jillson Political Science Professor cjillson@mail.smu.edu |
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